


Tolerate It

by get_out_of_my_cas



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Angst, Angst with a Happy Ending, Based on a Taylor Swift Song, But definitely angst, Castiel POV, Flashbacking, M/M, Taylor Swift - Freeform, difficult dean, some canon storylines
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-27
Updated: 2020-12-27
Packaged: 2021-03-10 22:28:04
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,343
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28354692
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/get_out_of_my_cas/pseuds/get_out_of_my_cas
Summary: Motel nights, long drives, bar fights; love and every painful step in between.Dean and Cas, through Castiel eye's, set to Tolerate It by Taylor Swift.
Relationships: Castiel/Dean Winchester
Comments: 10
Kudos: 49





	Tolerate It

**Author's Note:**

> Hey all, I wrote this after hearing the song and thinking about their relationship, about Cas, about Cas loving Dean, and about Dean being difficult sometimes. Really difficult.
> 
> Feel free to leave comments/ideas/feedback/whatever <3
> 
> (warnings: some mild violence (bar fight), some self-destructive/harming behaviors)

_Now_.

  
Cas is driving down a desert road, squinting into headlights as they pass. It’s midnight, or at least a little past. The stars are shimmering like rippling heat, but it must be freezing right now (Cas can’t feel it) because Dean is shivering. He’s sitting shotgun, asleep, his head propped against a flannel bundled loose. His hands are twitching in his lap, he’s curled in on himself. Cas passes a hand over his shoulder, letting a little grace slip out from his fingers as they graze Dean’s shirt. His shivering stalls and he shifts in his seat, murmuring a hum of nothing. He breathes a little deeper. The hunt had gone well enough, simple Salt n Burn of some ghost upset over a mine shaft out in the middle of—as Dean calls it— “butt-fuck nowhere”. Sammy was back at home, arm still in a cast from the last hunt gone south. Just Cas and Dean this time. Cas has been driving for an hour but the hotel’s at least another 30 minutes out, if he even finds it. It’s cacti and desert road and the occasional snore from Dean. He hits the stereo’s nob, keeping the volume low so it doesn’t wake Dean. Dean never plays the radio, only his tapes. They are great, Dean’s tapes, but they never change. The radio is nice. A commercial fades and a piano starts flickering in. The radio’s cutting in and out but a girl’s singing now, lilting above the piano’s falling notes. 

**//I sit and watch you reading with your head low**   
**I wake and watch you breathing with your eyes closed//**   
**I sit and watch you//**

  
_Then_.

Cas’ eyes fluttered open, itchy and dry from the motel air conditioner. The sun was only barely breaking the horizon. It was early still. He turned over, careful not to wake Dean sleeping beside him. The motel had two rooms but only one queen bed in each. Sam had taken one room, Dean suggested Cas and him grab the other. One one hand, Cas hated being human. He hated being hungry, hated feeling his legs ache, hated when the sweater scratched his neck and the coffee burned his tongue. Hated having to drive everywhere. Hated feeling so powerless.   
But it fell away at night. It slipped away in lying down, in hearing Dean’s breath ebb and flow like the lapping tide. He hated his body until Dean touched it, until electricity danced in the wake of rough fingers sliding soft. Hated the shiver of goosebumps across his arms until Dean handed him his coat —”take it Cas, I’m not cold”—and then goosebumps gave way to warmth and the smell of leather and Dean. He hated waking up unless Dean was there, unless Dean’s warmth reached out across the sheets like Cas wished he could so many times. But it was still early. So Cas just watched, watched the rise of Dean’s back, studied its slope into the sheets that pooled around his waist. Counted freckles on Dean’s arm. Worried when Dean’s brow furrowed in a dream— _where are you Dean? Am I there?_ Lifted the sheets higher over Dean when the stupid A/C kicked in, drafting frigid air across the room. Almost tasted the sun as it danced across Dean’s neck, licking little sandy blonde hairs into fiery spires. 

  
Cas closed his eyes when Dean stirred in waking, pretended he was asleep even though Dean caught him. He caught him every time. 

“Cas, stop staring” Dean would say. The softest hint of a smile? On that mouth, that mouth pressing deep into that pillow. Pressing deep against Cas’, in every day dream, hinted in every hitched breath when Dean stands a little too close, licks his own. Dean pushed Cas’ shoulder with his hand, not bothering to open his eyes. 

“Sorry, Dean” Cas said. He was not sorry though. Dean was an immaculate creation, an existence of beauty and richness and warmth and strength. Cas could never be sorry. 

“‘S okay...” 

**//I notice everything you do or don't do**

**If it's all in my head tell me now**  
 **Tell me I've got it wrong somehow** **//**

 _Then_. 

  
Cas catalogues Dean’s tenderness. “Coffee for Cas. One ice cube. Three sugars.” A rub on the shoulder. The better side of the motel bed. The better side of his anger, when he should be mad, but he isn’t. A missed call. A voicemail. “Come back from your cloud in the sky Dumbo.” What’s not said, if only because it’s shown. Things Dean takes: punches from a vamp, Cas’ sour moods, the tomatoes out of a burger. And what he doesn’t: Promises for granted. The kitten Cas finds outside the bunker that he nurses back to health. The kitten Dean is actually allergic to, the one Cas is sure Dean will send out for adoption but _please, he has nowhere to go, Dean, we’ve bonded, please._ The same one that becomes a cat Dean feeds when Cas is gone—even plays with—and then is suddenly a loss that leaves Cas’ empty for two weeks. Dean teases a moment— _Cas, he just found some new friends in the woods, I’m sure_ —but when it doesn’t shake the second week, it’s all very real to Dean, who brings Cas tea without being asked and secretly searches online for kittens to adopt. 

A text of a dog he saw in the street. 

A figure of an angel from a gift-shop. "Cas, it’s you." 

A prayer. 

But Cas cannot shake Dean’s coarse edges, the bits that snag Cas’ skin, cut him in passing. Wounds that he will pick at. Pick at if only to test that they still hurt. “Cas, buddy, You can’t stay.” A betrayal. A miscommunication. The refusal not to understand. Eyes that do not meet. Hands that flex at Dean’s side, hands that shake Cas, knuckles kissed before they make contact with Cas’ jaw. A week without speaking. Bristling tension, skin that burns at the touch, a pot boiling over in the kitchen, a fight in the bunker’s living room. Thoughts made manifest into words, words that should have stayed thoughts. A lie. An omission of truth. Landmines hidden in plain sight, self-fulfilling prophecies, traps Dean sets so they can be sprung. The same wound tearing open and open again although it bled dry years ago, but the pain is somehow always a surprise. Always fresh. 

  
/ **/** **I wait by the door like I'm just a kid**  
 **Use my best colors for your portrait**  
 **Lay the table with the fancy shit**  
 **And watch you tolerate it** **//**

_Then._

Cas stands outside Dean’s door. He knocks softly. 

“Dinner’s ready,” he says, leaning against the frame. His hands fumble over themselves, his mouth fumbles over what he can’t say. He waits. He knows Dean is on the other side, he’s been inside his room all day. Another minute. 

“Not hungry Cas,” he calls out from the other side. 

“Dean, you need to eat…” 

“Not now, Cas” 

“Okay. I...I already ate. I set out a plate for you.” Another beat of silence. And another. 

Cas turns and leaves, heading back to his room. He tried to make burgers for Dean; a stupid apology that’s so little compared to how fucked up his fuck-up was that it was borderline insulting. He can’t stand the silence, Dean’s silence. It was like a bore drilling him between his eyes, a pain he was forcing himself to bear because of course, Dean had every right to be upset. He spends the rest of the night in his room sitting on his bed in the dark, hand over his mouth so he doesn’t scream, rocking back and forth. He's punching his thigh with a balled fist, though he doesn't notice. A bruise will form, dark and blotchy. It blooms against the pallor of his skin, rising to the surface, as if the blood was leaking out from the inside, from internal wounds. It hurts but not enough, never lessening the nerve-decay settled deep between his ribs. 

In the morning he runs into him in the kitchen. Cas freezes and Dean goes rigid at the kitchen sink, his back tensing under his shirt. Cas stands there silently. Dean lowers the plate in his hands. 

“I’m not going to bite you. Stop sneaking around like I’m some fucking broken animal.”

Cas doesn’t know what to say. He had so many words to explain what he was thinking in teaming with Crowley, so many sentences that made sense, motivations that were pure. They were pure once but they soiled, ran rancid, rotted in the distance between then and now. They fail him as he stands there. Like he failed Dean. Another apology would only drive the knife deeper, anger Dean until the plate was flying at the wall and shattering, porcelain shards scattering across the tile—a mocking applause. Cas would bend to pick them up and Dean would yell something like “You’re not the fucking maid! Just go.” and Cas would go and lock himself in his room again and turn off the lights and wait.   


So Cas doesn’t say anything, he just joins Dean at the counter, pours himself a coffee. He turns and leans back against the counter and thinks of something else to say, something that he hasn’t already said a hundred times. He stares at his reflection in the coffee's surface, watch it dance in distortion. He doesn't recognize himself in the rippling surface. Or even the mirror, he thinks. _What does Dean see?_ He does not ask. 

Dean speaks first. “I just…” He says, putting the plate down into the sink, placing his hands on the counter’s rim. He glances at Cas, who’s staring down. They both staring down. 

“I just....need time, Cas. I just need time.” Cas is about to say something when Dean puts his hands on his shoulder, _not now_ , and he turns and goes. Cas pushes his thumb into the bruise on his thigh. 

**// I greet you with a battle hero's welcome**   
**I take your indiscretions all in good fun//**

  
_Then._

Cas spots him outside the bar across the street. He’s too far away to get there in time. They’re going to get a few punches in, maybe a few kicks depending on how many Dean’s had. It’s dark and Cas can hardly see; dim shadows dance on walls. Dean’s face flashes in the light of a headlights as a fist connects with his jaw. Blood glitters in the air. Cas is trying to cross the road but the cars are flying by, freezing air licking across his skin. In between passing cars Dean is rolling on the ground, still shouting some taunt, still edging them on. There’s a kick in the ribs Cas can feel from across the street. He bolts through a break in the cars, doesn’t even hear the honks. He’s between them now—Dean and the three bikers he’s managed to piss off—and grabs him by the armpits, practically dragging him off while Dean continues to scream. Dean is fucking drunk, his words slurred in a mix of alcohol and the crimson blood pooling in his mouth. He spits it to the ground and shoves Castiel off, turning to walk off towards the car.   


“Dean,” Cas says, trying to catch up.   


“Let it go, Cas” Dean says, spitting out another mouthful of blood. He’s flexing his hands against his sides and breathing heavy, puffs of breath dissipating into the night. He stands facing the street, squinting into the headlights, not moving, just breathing. Cas can’t even get a word in before he’s halfway across yellow lines, flipping off a honking driver. 

It’s not the first time Dean’s done this. Got wasted at some bar, riled up some biker or some townie, hit on their girlfriend, nagged them into a fight. At first Cas thought it was an accident, a drunken night gone south. _Fool me once_. Then there was a second. A third. By the fourth, it was clear. They were a punishment. A punishment Dean incited on himself when he couldn’t find the words to say sorry. An equalizer for all the fuck ups, all the people he’d let die, a punch for for every one he couldn’t save. Sometimes he punched back, murmured lost names between swings. Others were spoken out in the crack of a jaw, the slap of skin on skin. The snap of a rib, when Dean had gone too far. 

“Dean. Stop.” Cas says, catching up and grabbing his shoulder.   


“I’m fine, Cas. Let’s just go,” Dean says, shaking him off, opening the car door. He stops first, dabbing his bleeding nose with his shirt. He ducks in, sits shotgun. Slams the door. 

Cas lays into him. Like he did last time. 

“God, you’re a fucking piece of work, you know that?” 

“Jeez, love you too, Cas” 

“I spent all night looking for you. I drove up and down this shit fucking town looking for you.”

“Well, Cas, nobody asked you to. I don’t know if you noticed, but you’re not my fucking babysitter.” Dean spits. Dean turns on the music. blaring it. Cas turns it off.

  
“No I’m not you’re fucking babysitter, Dean. Because unlike a babysitter, I’m not getting paid to take care of you.” _I care. If you weren’t busy being an asshole, hey, you might notice._ Dean looks out the window. 

“I didn’t ask you to come." A beat. "I don’t need saving, I can handle my own” Dean says to the passing trees. _I don’t need your judgement. Unlimited supply right here, made in house, Dean Winchester & Co. _

Cas sighs. “...Only from yourself,” he says, almost to himself more than Dean. 

Dean flexes his hand in his lap. Something pops, broken. He sighs. He rubs his hand over his face, shifts in his seat. He leans forward, putting his hands into his face. He waits a long time before he speaks. He leans back, throwing his hands up in the air. “I’m sorry. I...I didn’t mean to make you worry. I...Let’s just forget it.” 

They drive in silence. Cas' hands wring the steering wheel, Dean resists the urge to soothe them, to stop their incessant writhing, to get Cas to just leave it. Cas speaks, but he stares straight ahead. 

“Why? _Please Dean._

“Why what?” _No._

“Why do you do it?" _I can’t help you if you don’t let me._

“Do what?” _I don’t need your help._

“Punish yourself.” _And me._

“What? I’m not." _Quit while you're ahead._

Cas just stares at him.

"Those guys were groping some girl, I wasn’t gonna—” _Drop it._

“Dean.” _Please._

“I wasn’t gonna stand around while they—” _Cas, Drop it._

“ENOUGH! Enough, Dean!” Cas barks. “Enough.” _You are hurting me and you know it and you don’t care._

Dean stops talking, stares down at his hands. Cas stares forward in the road, unflinching when the headlights blind him. 

  
“I don’t know,” Dean nearly whispers. He pinches the bridge of his nose. He pauses, hand propped up in the air before letting it fall. “I don’t know, Cas, I just…” He turns to the window again.

Cas glances over but Dean won’t meet his gaze. Just stares farther out into the trees. Cas sighs. 

“Thank you,” Dean says, after a while. “For coming and getting me, Cas. Thank you, I...I’m sorry...I’m sorry...I’m trying." 

**// While you were out building other worlds, where was I?**   
**Where's that man who'd throw blankets over my barbed wire?//**   
  
_Then._

“Cas, buddy, you can't stay.” 

The floor is hard. The cardboard is doing nothing to stop the chill that’s raking its long fingers up and down Cas bones. His back is throbbing, a dull ache that shoots every time he turns over. He’s turning over a lot. He feels like throwing up but there’s nothing in his stomach; there hasn’t been for three days. 

Cas had packed his bags quickly at first, but slowed at the end, dreading stepping out of the bunker and into the cold. When he stepped out in the main room, Dean wasn’t there. He made his way up the stairs, with every step carving a new chunk out of a dwindling hope of “Wait! Don’t go”. It doesn't come. 

**//I made you my temple, my mural, my sky//**

  
_Then._

This was immaculate beauty. This was divinity made flesh. This was lightness and grace and strength and it was blinding Castiel. It was Dean Winchester’s soul, laid bare in his hands, pure energy that pulsed at the borders of his consciousness, threatening to consume him. It was powerful and raw, it was enveloping and nurturing. It shimmered like blinding rays of midday sun, like heat on desert sand. It was cosmic, expanding into the depths of Castiel’s being bearing glimmering light. It was whole again. 

**// Now I'm begging for footnotes in the story of your life**   
**Drawing hearts in the byline**   
**Always taking up too much space and time**   
**//**

_Then._

“I gave everything for you. I sacrificed Heaven, my grace!” Cas was starting to yell, anger pulsing through him all the way to the tips of his fingerprints. “I fell for you, I killed so you could live, I died for you.” Tears were creeping in at the edges of Cas’ eyes now, but he couldn’t stop himself. His mouth was speaking from his heart, direct line. “I did all of that for you!”

Dean slams down his gun onto the table. “Exactly! You shouldn’t have to! Damnit Cas. Everybody—every. single. person—I have ever loved I have gotten killed or watched die. I am not going to let that be you. ” Their voices echo off the bunker’s tall walls, parroting them back in distortion. “You deserve better, you deserve a real life, not this. Not hunting, not dying, not this." 

“God, you are so infuriating. Did you ever stop to think maybe I fucking wanted this? That I want to be here, that I want to be with _you_ , that nobody forced to give up everything but that I did because I wanted to? Why can't you just accept that? Why do you think you don’t deserve to be loved? Every time, you think that the rest of us would all be better if you were dead. I would die tomorrow. I would fucking die tomorrow if you ever pulled something like that. Don’t you ever fucking tell me that I deserve better than what I _chose_ to rebel for. Than what I gave everything for.” The tears were slipping now, sliding long streaks down Cas’ face. Dean has been pacing back and forth, every tense muscle rejecting Cas' words, shielding himself from a truth he can't bear to witness. When he looks up and sees Cas, Cas with his hands in his face, Cas racked by sobs, he loses it.

He steps forward, swallowing Cas in his arms, pulling him tight. “Hey, hey, Cas, come on Cas,” but Cas was pushing his arms into Dean, fighting against him. Dean only held on stronger and now Cas was punching his chest in little fists, tears pulsing down his cheek. He eventually caved, folding into Dean, full sobs raking up and down his spine. They slide to the floor, Dean cradling Cas now, tears welling up in his own eyes. 

“I'm so sorry, Cas. I...I” Dean said, nudging the crown of Cas’ head with his cheek. “I just, I just, I just fuck everything up. I fuck it up. I won’t let myself hurt you again. But I will. I will. I'm not good for you, I'm not enough” Dean says. _Just like right now._ His eyes crunch against the oncoming tears. _Just like right now._

“Why won’t you love me?” Cas says into Dean’s chest, burying his face into his shirt. “....Why can’t you love me?” 

Every molecule in Dean threatens to split. He’s silent for a while. 

“I don’t know how.” he finally admits, quietly, almost to himself. Cas’ tears have run dry but he’s silent, gone still now in Dean’s arm. “I love you, Cas. Of course, of course I love you. I love you. I need you. I need you every day. I need you so much it terrifies me. It terrifies me.”

  
**// What would you do if I**   
**Break free and leave us in ruins**   
**Took this dagger in me and removed it**   
**I need you dreams**   
**Gain the weight of you then lose it**   
**Believe me, I could do it**   
**//**

_Then_. 

“Don’t do this, Cas.” 

The blade is familiar in Cas’ hand. It almost throbs in his fist, singing for flesh. 

“I need you.” Dean’s voice cracks. The blade falls, sinking into his chest. It hits bone and diverts, slicing through an artery, blood pooling down Dean’s chest. It runs across Cas’ hand, warm and slippery. He pulls the blade out and Dean slumps down, head falling forward before his whole form falls back. There’s a crack of his head on the concrete, but it doesn’t register on his face. His eyes are closed. They stay closed. 

  
“Please, Cas”

The blade is home now in his fist. He does not hesitate. 

“Please—”

The blade slices in deep and clean. Cas leaves it in, letting it slip from his hand as Dean slumps to his knees. There’s a small groan, then a silent tumble. 

“I need you, Cas.” 

The blade is heavy. Fingers feeling cold, metal feeling warm. It is still in his grip. It does not vibrate like before. 

“I need you.” Cas snaps back. Dean is kneeling, bloodied eyes pleading to Cas. Pleading for him. Cas hears the drop of the blade before he’s realized he has let it go. He flees. 

  
**// I sit and watch you //**

_Now._

Cas pulls into the motel parking lot, his beams illuminating the flash of a cat as it scurries off. He shakes Dean’s shoulder lightly, stirring him awake. 

“Dean, we’re here.” Cas says, opening his door. 

“Hmmm? Oh” Dean says, rubbing his eyes and then his arms. Damn, it was cold. He gets out, stretches his limbs. 

The trunk clips close as Dean grabs their bags, barely shaking off the sleep lingering around his eyes. If Cas doesn't hurry with the keys he’s going to fall asleep standing up like a horse. 

Dean is stirred by the sound of jiggling keys, then he wrangles himself through the door into the room. He drops the bags and sloughs onto the bed, kicking his shoes off before rolling over onto his back. Cas is busy fiddling with the heater, trying to get it to turn on. It whirs up and he steps back, Dean’s arms reaching out to pull him back by his waist. 

“Come here,” Dean says, pulling Cas down onto the bed. He wraps his arms around him, pulling him flush against his chest. He nuzzles the crown of Cas’ head. Motel heater be damned, Cas thinks. Dean is warm enough. “Thank you for driving,” he says, yawning. 

“Of course,” Cas says, curling himself inside Dean’s arms and legs, breathing him in deeply. He roots his hands through Dean’s hair, grabs a fistful of his shirt. 

“How long was I out?” Dean asks, rubbing one hand along Castiel’s back. His nails are trailing up and down Cas’ left arm. Cas’ hair tickles under his jaw. 

“I don’t know, maybe an hour?” Cas says, nuzzling his nose into Dean’s chest. Dean starts peeling Cas’ big jacket off, big hands making quick work. Cas settles back in, feels Dean’s heartbeat against his cheek. 

“Oh, shit. Sorry,” Dean says, slipping himself under the covers. He pulls them up and over them. “Should’ve stayed awake. Kept you company.” 

“It’s okay, I didn’t mind. The radio was nice. Let me think for a while” Cas says. Dean’s legs intertwine with Cas; Dean hisses when he meets Cas’ freezing feet. The abominable Cas-man, as Dean calls him. Cas is still trying to figure that one out. 

“Uh oh.” Dean says, pulling back his head from Cas’. “What about?” 

“I don’t know. Just thinking. About us,” Cas says, planting a kiss against the Dean’s throat, nosing right under his ear. 

“Oh? Am I in trouble?” Dean’s eyebrow cocks slightly, a teasing grin. 

“No, not like that.” Cas said, pulling Dean’s arms around him tighter. “Just thinking about us. About you. How much I love you” he says, burning his nose in Dean’s chest. The words don't sting like they used to. Dean does not recoil, does not wince, does not fight Cas and himself. Instead he pulls Cas closer, hand nudging Cas’ jaw upwards and now they’re kissing. It’s short and soft, Dean’s thumb rubbing along Cas’ jaw. His other hand sweeps up Cas' back, palm splayed. Cas leans harder into Dean, pushing himself flush against all that he is, all that is holding the edges of Cas’ existence into place, shielding him from everything beyond the space between them now. Dean pythons his arms around Cas, pulls him on top of him, runs a hand down to the small of his back. Dean’s tongue skims Cas’ bottom lip, Cas teases back, Dean opens the kiss. It’s slow and lazy, sleep winking in at the corners. Dean breaks off to run kisses down Cas’ neck, circling back to press one to his forehead. Cas collapses back onto Dean, runs his arms up around his neck, one slipping under a pillow. 

“I love you too, Cas” Dean whispers into Cas’ ear. “I love you.” He shifted again, nuzzling himself deeper into Cas and the bed. If he could say it a million times he would, though it would never be enough. But he tries. “I love you.....I love you.......I-louve-yew..........I-lob-yoo...Ilov-yew, Iloeyou, i.......lov” His head slacks off Cas; he’s asleep now, lips barely miming the words. Cas pulls him as tight as he can, breathing him in and out, in and out with every breath. In and out. And he waits until the morning. 

  



End file.
